It’s Sunday evening. This weekend has been good. The last of the regular friends arrived back in Nairobi and everything feels relatively normal. Yesterday was chilled – a Kenyan friend came over in the morning and we cooked up a fried breakfast. I went shopping for greeting cards over at Yaya Shopping Centre – most cards in Kenya are imported from Britain and feature canal boats or sports cards. At Yaya, they have some that are locally made. I spent the afternoon in the new office building where I sought to put some substance on my plans to visit Britain later in the year. Chiefly in my mind were two questions: firstly, how long should I return for; and secondly, would it work logistically for me to visit somewhere else as part of the return journey. After several hours of searching and double checking, I think a plan has emerged, and so I’ll now go away and discuss and pray it through.
Anyway, what I wanted to write about today is Christmas in Kenya. Among those my age, we joke every November that Christmas doesn’t begin until you see a Coca Cola billboard of Santa or hear the ‘holidays are coming’ refrain. This year Christmas began for me while driving towards ‘Junction’ – there in front of me was a billboard sixty feet wide and thirty foot high, in which Santa was reclining while drinking a Coke. Nairobi is not as warm as many parts of Africa, but as ever Santa was there with his thick red coat.
The previous Christmas – my first in Kenya – I remember being intrigued that Santa could be Kenyan. My British conditioning says that Santa is white and either Scandinavian or British (possibly from Yorkshire). Is the ‘spell’ of Santa over children broken if he is a Kenyan wearing a white beard? I don’t know.
Christmas in Britain is deeply connected with all of my senses – the pricking of the Christmas tree on my fingers as we carry it into the house. The tastes and smells of mulled wine, turkey, Cranberry Sauce and alike. The claustrophobia of having far too many relatives and family members in one house. The oppressive heat of a log fire and the winter chill outside.
In Kenya, much of this is stripped away. My senses were thankfully appeased early in December when Tom (my brother) and I were invited round to a colleague’s house for mulled wine, apple cider and ‘A Christmas Carol’ – the 1970 musical version rather than the Muppets’.
I spent Christmas Day with my brother in Nairobi. The day’s before and Christmas Day itself had particularly unique flavour to them. The evening of Wednesday 23rd brought a storm through Nairobi, and unusually this one included about fifteen minutes of strong gusting wind. Tom and myself were at my house at the time – we had just conquered the roads from Westgate Mall back to my house in driving rain - by utilising every back street and with a little bit of good luck in leaving Westgate just before the storm hit we had been spared the traffic chaos and were feeling very pleased with ourselves. Around our neighbourhood, many trees were felled onto power lines and across roads, roofs and billboards toppled and neighbourhoods flooded. It was 48 hours until our power was restored.
Seeing as we had just bought some frozen turkey, and the oven was electric, Christmas therefore happened at a house in the compound next door which is used by visitors who come to Nairobi. Some of the houses had regained some power so we were hoping to find the house fully functioning. This was not quite the case – the house was experiencing a ‘brown out’ meaning the voltage was low. There were only enough volts to make the TV and the Playstation 3 function – result! We were also surprised to discover that the oven was in fact gas rather than electric – Christmas was back on schedule. We had a wonderful feast of turkey, roast potatoes, carrots, leaks, stuffing, ‘pigs in blankets’ and gravy. The food worked better than I could possibly have imagined. And while the power weakened through the morning, we were still able to listen to music and watch some DVDs off the computer.
Seeing as we were in Nairobi, on the Sunday after Christmas we made our way to church. After the service I struggled to know what to say to many of the Kenyans and Sudanese ‘refugees’ (most of the Sudanese have been in Kenya for 10 or more years now):
[Awkward pause]
Not the greatest of conversations.
So that’s Christmas for another year. Hopefully next year I’ll finally get Christmas cards sent to everyone, rather than just the emergency ones to the family and a few friends. I’m thankful for the opportunity to really savour Christmas this year. I feel like it truly was Christmas and so now I’m hoping Easter will be equally memorable and special.
